ShinyHunters Claims Theft of 2-3TB of FBI Employee Data

The group's spokesperson told 404 Media, "We hacked the FBI. We hold data on all FBI employees and applicants." According to that source, ShinyHunters gained access by using a zero-day exploit in Oracle's PeopleSoft program to reach Amazon Web Services' GovCloud servers. The hackers also appeared responsible for an unauthorized takeover of the FBI website earlier this week.

The FBI told Reuters it was aware of "a cyber-criminal enterprise group claiming a compromise of the FBIJobs.gov portal and alleged impact to FBI employee personally identifiable information" and that it is "actively and aggressively investigating the matter."

The attackers claim to hold 2 to 3 terabytes of data. The sample shared with media outlets appeared to contain names, addresses, telephone numbers, dates of birth, Social Security numbers and emergency contact details for 5,000 FBI employees. The group may also have gathered details about some work assignments for agents and about some FBI units working on intelligence, security and counter-espionage efforts, including operations focused on China and Russia.

ShinyHunters has previously conducted hacks aimed at extortion, with actions against parties including Ticketmaster and Rockstar Games in recent years. But the representative who spoke with 404 Media claimed the move against the FBI was "not financially motivated" and was instead aimed at coercing the government agency to remove or amend a previous statement made about ShinyHunters. In a report from May, the FBI said the hacking group "exaggerated claims of access to sensitive or personal information to prompt payment from victims."